Write a poem using only one syllable words. When you revise it, you can cheat.
Prompt: One Syllable Words
Tag: Writing Prompt
Prompt: Dreams
From an old Poets and Writers: Think about dreams you’ve had in the past that still linger, or search through old writing to dig up images that are repeated. Write a poem that attempt to find meaning or a connection within these visual artifacts. How can you interpret their significance now?
Prompt: Family Rituals
From The Writer’s Idea Book by Jack Heffron: Write about a family ritual. How did it start? Why has it continued? Do your family members have nicknames for each other? How did they start? Why do they stick? What do the nicknames suggest about the roles people play in your family?
Prompt: An Object Poem
I did this one yesterday and had a good result. From Western Wind, an Introduction to Poetry by David Mason and John Frederick Nims. Write a descriptive poem (of, say, a dozen lines) about a familiar object or anything of interest to you. Do not use any adjectives until the last line; then try to use, effectively, a series of three. Here’s a famous example from Charles Simic.
Fork – by Charles Simic
This strange thing must have crept
Right out of hell.
It resembles a bird’s foot
Worn around the cannibal’s neck.
As you hold it in your hand,
As you stab with it into a piece of meat,
It is possible to imagine the rest of the bird:
Its head which like your fist
Is large, bald, beakless, and blind.
Prompt: Reverse a Problem Poem
Every once in a while, this will work. Take a poem that seems lost but has some good lines. Reverse it. That is, take the last line as the first line and rebuild it from the bottom up. Usually last lines are good, so start with that one. If it changes, so be it. I think Sekou Sundiata taught me this.
Prompt: Song or Literary Work
From Western Wind, an Introduction to Poetry edited by David Mason and John Frederick Nims.
Write a poem alluding to a song or literary work that only someone of your generation would know. Can you make your poem comprehensible to readers of other generations?
Prompt: Let’s Cut
Let’s cut. I edited a prose poem from 237 words to 99. It was much better for it. I didn’t think I could do it, but it got easier and easier to lose things that weren’t working. So take a piece of flabby, unsuccessful writing and see what you can lose from it, trim it to see the real beauty under the fleshy flesh.
Prompt: “I Put a Spell on You”
Eye of newt: Write a spell to make something happen or to change something. Be sure to use lots of relevant details to help the casting.
Poetry Prompt from Elizabeth Kerlikowske
Reading poetry can be good in hard times. Writing poetry can be better. How else do we figure out what is truly on our minds unless we set it down on the page? Because we are not seeing many people now (I have seen four people other than my husband and the mail carrier since early march) it is more important than ever that we communicate, even if it is with ourselves.Sometimes I sit in front of the keyboard with nothing on my mind, and not in a good way. There’s actually too much spinning in my brain and I can’t seem to pluck one thought out of the mess to explore. So I use writing prompts from old textbooks, from books of prompts.
From now on, I’m going to post a prompt each day for you. I’ll tell you what book it’s from. At some point in the future, we can read each other’s when we meet again. And about prompts, do it even if you hate it. The point is not to write exactly what the prompt suggests, but just to write.
Today’s prompt, May 19, 2020
The Negative Inversion (from a hand-out I got somewhere)
Take a poem by someone else, place it on your desk and add a blank piece of paper beside the poem.
Go to the first line. On the blank paper, write the opposite of that line. For example, How I love thee? might become Why do you hate me? It’s kind of fun deciding what is the opposite of The Red Wheelbarrow: the blue LeSabre? the gray mitten?
Do this with each line. You may find yourself wanting to write something else, so go with that. After you run out of steam, go back to the prompt poem. Revise as needed. Keep surprises. Check the diction. Make it better.
Now you will never have a day when you can’t write anything! Enjoy.
Elizabeth Kerlikowske
Poetry Society of Michigan 